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How To Win Friends And Influence People
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About the Book
"How to Influence People" by John Maxwell provides practical advice on how to effectively influence and persuade others. Maxwell emphasizes the importance of relationships, authenticity, and empathy in building trust and influence with others. He offers strategies for developing influential communication skills and techniques for gaining influence in various personal and professional settings. Overall, the book serves as a guide for individuals seeking to enhance their ability to positively impact and inspire others.
Kathryn Kuhlman
Kathryn Johanna Kuhlman was born on May 9, 1907, in Concordia, Missouri. Her parents were German and she was one of four children. Her mother was a harsh disciplinarian, who showed little love or affection. On the other hand, she had an extremely close and loving relationship with her father. She would describe, as a small child how, her father would come home from work and she would hang on his leg and cling to him. She often said that her relationship with God the Father was extremely real because of her relationship with her own father.
Kuhlman was converted, when she was 14, at an evangelistic meeting held in a small Methodist church. When she was 16 she graduated from high school, which only went to tenth grade in their town. He older sister Myrtle had married an itinerant evangelist, Everett B. Parrott. They spent their time traveling and asked that Kathryn could join them for the summer. Her parents agreed and she went to Oregon to help out. She worked with them, and often gave her testimony. When the summer was over she wanted to stay, and the couple agreed. She ended up working with them for five years.
The evangelistic team was made up of four people, Everette, Myrtle, Kathryn, and pianists named Helen Gulliford. In 1928 Everette missed a meeting in Boise, Idaho. Myrtle and Kathryn preached to cover for Everette. The pastor of the church encouraged Kathryn to step out on her own. Helen agreed to join her. Her first sermon was in a run-down pool hall in Boise, Idaho. The team covered Idaho, Utah, and Colorado for the following five years. In 1933 they moved into Pueblo, Colorado. They set up in an abandoned Montgomery Ward warehouse. They stayed there for six months.
Denver, being a much bigger city, was the next stop. They moved several times but ended up in a paper company's warehouse, which they named the Kuhlman Revival Tabernacle. Then in 1935 they moved once more to an abandoned truck garage they named the Denver Revival Tabernacle. Kathryn was seeing a lot of success in Denver. The church grew to about 2000 members. She began a radio show called "Smiling Through" and invited speakers from all over the country. One of them was Phil Kerr who taught on divine healing. In 1935 another invited evangelist was Burroughs Waltrip.
Waltrip was bad news for Kuhlman. He was a charismatic, handsome man several years older than she was. There was an immediate attraction, and one family claims to have seen the couple embracing in 1935, but he was married and had two children. Waltrip left Denver and went home to Austin, Texas, but the relationship simmered between Kuhlman and Waltrip. In 1937 he was invited back to Denver to take the pulpit for two months. Shortly after he divorced his wife and abandoned his two sons. He then spread the story that his wife had left him. He moved to Mason City, Iowa, where he told everyone he was single, and started a new ministry. Waltrip raised pledges of $70,000 to build a ministry building called Radio Chapel. It was state of the art with a disappearing pulpit and an art deco style. He appeared to be a successful and dynamic preacher.
There was an ongoing relationship between Kuhlman and Waltrip, and they married in September 1938. Kuhlman was naive about the consequences of her choices and the marriage was a disaster. She announced to her church that she and Waltrip were married and they would go between Denver and Mason City preaching at their two churches. Most of the people in her congregation left due to her relationship with Waltrip. She gave up her church in Denver, lost some of her closest associates, and moved to Mason City. Waltrip's success turned out to be a pipe dream as well. The Radio Chapel was completed in June of 1938. By October 1938 Waltrip could not meet his debts. In December Waltrip was demanding a higher salary, even with the shortfall in income. His Board of Directors quit and left him to deal with the finances. His solution was not to pay the mortgage or debts on the Chapel. Radio Chapel went into bankruptcy. Waltrip's last sermon was in May 1939. The Waltrips were on their own. Kathryn's happy vision of she and her husband flying back and forth between Denver and Mason City with a successful preaching careers was utterly demolished.
The next few years were very hard for the couple. They embarked on the road as traveling evangelists, primarily staying in the Midwest. They were not accepted in many places due to their marriage history. Initial advertisements listed Waltrip as the primary evangelist. Then occasionally Mrs. Waltrip was also mentioned. By the early 1940s Kathryn Kuhlman Waltrip was given equal billing. Finally by the mid-1940s Kathryn was using only Kathryn Kuhlman in meetings where she was the primary speaker. In 1944 Kuhlman went on an evangelistic tour on the east coast without Waltrip. It may have been a conscious decision to leave him, or she may also have taken the opportunity to reassess her life. It appears to have been more gradual as Waltrip wrote about them as a couple as late as 1946. Kuhlman never returned to Waltrip and they eventually divorced in 1947. She left her marriage behind and from then on acted as if it never existed in the first place.
In 1946 Kuhlman was asked to speak in Franklin, Pennsylvania. She was well received and decided to stay in the area. Kuhlman began preaching on radio broadcasts in Oil City, Pennsylvania. These became so popular they were picked up in Pittsburgh, and she was preaching throughout the area. She began to preach about the healing power of God. In 1947 a woman was healed of a tumor while listening to Kuhlman preach. Several Sundays later a man was also healed while she was teaching on the Holy Spirit. She was now convinced of God's healing work. One important thing to note is the context and timing of this breakout period in Kuhlman's life. 1947 was the beginning of the Healing Revival (sometimes referred to as the Latter Rain Revival) that would last for the next 10 years. What was happening in Kuhlman's meetings was breaking out across the United States. It was in this time frame that the Voice of Healing Ministry was established and men like William Branham, Oral Roberts, A.A. Allen and many others were propelled onto the public stage. Kuhlman was not associated with those groups, but stepped into the flow of what God's Spirit was doing across the nation and the world.
In 1948 Kuhlman held a series of meetings at Carnegie Hall in Pittsburgh. She eventually moved to Pittsburgh in 1950, and continued to hold meetings at Carnegie Hall until 1971. She was used by God to bring the charismatic message to many denominational churches, including the Catholic Church. (She received a lot of criticism over this and was accused of being a closet Catholic.) These were her best known years. Her style was flamboyant. She would hold her famous miracle services and the auditorium was filled to capacity every time. She was on radio and television shows. She was ordained in 1968 by the Evangelical Church Alliance. Hundreds of people were healed in her meetings, and even while listening to her on the radio or television. People she prayed for would often be hit with the power of God and be "slain in the Spirit." Kuhlman never claimed that she was the healer. She always pointed people to Jesus as their healer.
Kuhlman had been diagnosed with a heart problem in 1955. She kept a very busy schedule and overworked herself, especially in the 1970's. She traveled back and forth from Pittsburgh to Los Angeles frequently, as well as taking trips around the world. Her heart was enlarged and Kuhlman died on February 20, 1976, in Tulsa, following open-heart surgery. Videos of some of her services are still available and continue to be popular today.
Can Anyone Really Be “Blameless”
When you read the Psalms, do you identify with the psalmist when he claims blamelessness and uprightness and integrity and righteousness? Blamelessness Blessed are those whose way is blameless! (Psalm 119:1) I was blameless before him, and I kept myself from my guilt. (Psalm 18:23) I shall be blameless, and innocent of great transgression. (Psalm 19:13) Uprightness My shield is with God, who saves the upright in heart. (Psalm 7:10) The upright shall behold his face. (Psalm 11:7) Let all the upright in heart exult! (Psalm 64:10) Integrity Judge me, O Lord, according to the integrity that is in me. (Psalm 7:8) Vindicate me, O Lord, for I have walked in my integrity. (Psalm 26:1) You have upheld me because of my integrity. (Psalm 41:12) Righteousness The Lord upholds the righteous. (Psalm 37:17) He will never permit the righteous to be moved. (Psalm 55:22) The Lord loves the righteous. (Psalm 146:8) Are you among the righteous, the upright, the blameless, and those who walk in integrity? If you are a Christian, you should answer Yes. Imputed Righteousness: Foundation, Not Summation I do not say this simply because in Christ we are counted righteous. The psalmist is not talking only about imputed righteousness. The justification of the ungodly on the basis of Christ alone by faith alone is a precious and magnificent truth. And, to be sure, it was already true for the psalmists in the Old Testament, because Christ’s death counted for them in the mind of God before it happened in history. That’s the point of Romans 3:25. “The psalmists were justified by faith alone. But their faith worked through love.” When Paul wanted to support his teaching about the “justification of the ungodly,” he quoted Psalm 32. God justifies the ungodly . . . just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works: “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered; blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin.” (Romans 4:5–8) But this imputed righteousness, based on Christ alone, is not the sum of what the psalmists refer to when they speak of their blamelessness and uprightness and integrity and righteousness. Forgiveness and imputation are the foundation, but not the summation of Christian righteousness. Justifying Faith Leads to Integrity and Uprightness That is true in the New Testament and the Old. The faith that unites us to Christ and his perfect uprightness is real only if it also produces new attitudes and behaviors in us. Here’s the way Paul put it: “In Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love” (Galatians 5:6). The faith that links us to Christ for justification also leads to sanctification. That was true in the Old Testament as well. The psalmists were justified by faith alone. But their faith “worked through love.” It produced blamelessness and uprightness and integrity and righteousness. This was a work of the sanctifying Spirit of God. They knew it was God’s work not their own: Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit. (Psalm 51:10–12) The same dynamics of justification and sanctification at work in the godly psalmists are at work in Christians today, even though we have the privilege of knowing so much more about how the Lord purchased all this by his blood, and how it is working out in the power of the risen Christ. Psalmists Are Not Legalists Therefore, it is a mistake to read the Psalms and somehow think that these writers were legalists or egomaniacs or naïve when they referred to their blamelessness and uprightness and integrity and righteousness. Along with the psalmists, Christians must be blameless, upright, righteous persons of integrity. Example of Psalm 25 “He is not perfect. He is not without sin. He is not proud. He is the beneficiary of mighty mercy.” Consider Psalm 25 as an example of what this looks like. It is a beautiful psalm of deep humility and longing for God. Four times in these 22 verses David acknowledges his sin. His confession and his sense of need for grace is not just mentioned at the beginning of the psalm and then left behind as he moves on in triumph. Remember not the sins of my youth or my transgressions. (Psalm 25:7) Good and upright is the Lord; therefore he instructs sinners in the way. (Psalm 25:8) For your name’s sake, O Lord, pardon my guilt, for it is great. (Psalm 25:11) Consider my affliction and my trouble, and forgive all my sins. (Psalm 25:18) Since his sins are a constant reality to him, so is the mercy and love and grace and goodness of God. Remember your mercy, O Lord, and your steadfast love. (Psalm 25:6) According to your steadfast love remember me, for the sake of your goodness, O Lord! (Psalm 25:7) All the paths of the Lord are steadfast love. (Psalm 25:10) Turn to me and be gracious to me. (Psalm 25:16) David knew that if his guilt was to be pardoned, it would not be on the basis of his own virtue, but on the basis of God’s allegiance to his own name: “For your name’s sake, O Lord, pardon my guilt, for it is great” (Psalm 25:11). Sinner’s Response to God How then does David describe his response to God? Answer: trusting, waiting, humility, covenant keeping, fearing the Lord, and taking refuge in him. My God, in you I trust. (Psalm 25:2) For you I wait all the day long. (Psalm 25:5, 21) He leads the humble in what is right, and teaches the humble his way. (Psalm 25:9) All the paths of the Lord are steadfast love and faithfulness, for those who keep his covenant. (Psalm 25:10) Who is the man who fears the Lord? Him will he instruct in the way that he should choose. (Psalm 25:12, 14) Let me not be put to shame, for I take refuge in you. (Psalm 25:20) Most of us are thrilled with this kind of Psalm. It acknowledges sin. It ascribes mercy and grace to God. The psalmist trusts in that mercy and holds fast to the forgiving God. Integrity and Uprightness Preserve Me But then comes verse 21: “May integrity and uprightness preserve me, for I wait for you” (Psalm 25:21). What I am arguing is that his appeal to his own integrity and uprightness is not a lapse in humble, faith-filled godliness. I am arguing that this is a proper claim of the godly in every age. This is not pride. This is not self-reliance. This is not legalism. This is not salvation-by-works. This is a godly man, trusting the mercy of God, knowing his sins are forgiven, walking in the power of God’s sanctifying Spirit. He is a man of integrity and uprightness. He is not perfect. He is not without sin. He is not proud. He is the beneficiary of mighty mercy — transforming mercy. It was “for God’s name’s sake” that his great guilt was pardoned (Psalm 25:11). And it is “for God’s name’s sake” that he walks in integrity and uprightness. As Psalm 23:3 says, “He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” Don’t Stumble over Integrity “The faith that unites us to Christ’s perfect uprightness is real only if it produces new attitudes and behaviors.” We do not need to stumble over these protests of integrity in the Psalms. In both Old and New Testament times, God justifies the ungodly, sanctifies the faithful, and rewards their new Spirit-wrought righteousness. It is not legalism or works-righteousness to say with the psalmist, “You have upheld me because of my integrity” (Psalm 41:12). It is not pride or self-sufficiency to say, “The Lord has rewarded me according to my righteousness, according to the cleanness of my hands in his sight” (Psalm 18:23–24). The New Testament is just as strong that “doing good” in the power of God’s Spirit, from a heart of faith, will be rewarded with eternal life and all the varied benefits that belong to our varied faithfulness. The one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. (Galatians 6:8–9) Whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord. (Ephesians 6:8) The one who receives a righteous person because he is a righteous person will receive a righteous person’s reward. (Matthew 10:41) Love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great. (Luke 6:35) We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil. (2 Corinthians 5:10) Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. (Colossians 3:23–24) Trust in the Lord, and Do Good Therefore, when you read in the Psalms that the psalmists offer up their blamelessness and uprightness and integrity and righteousness to God, don’t over-spiritualize it. Don’t treat it as perfectionism. Don’t think of it as legalism. Don’t demean it as a defective part of the “old covenant.” Take it for what it is: a godly man, who knows he is a sinner, pardoned for God’s name’s sake, justified by grace, trusting God’s mercy, depending on God’s Spirit, taking refuge in God’s protection, delighting in God’s beauty, keeping God’s covenant, and therefore walking in integrity and honesty and uprightness. When viewed in this way, the Psalms become precious beyond measure as they help us “trust in the Lord, and do good” (Psalm 37:3). Article by John Piper Founder & Teacher, desiringGod.org
